The New Geopolitics of
Educational Aid: From
Cold Wars to Holy Wars?
Mario Novelli
University of Amsterdam
[email protected]
IDS Lecture Series, October 15, 2009
Outline
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Introduction: from neoliberalization to militarisation in
global governance of education and development
Post Cold War New Wars?
Post Cold War interventionism & education
The rise of Interest in Education & Conflict
Back to the Future? Education Aid and the Cold War
Are we all soldiers now? Education as Counterinsurgency
Between empire & utopia: education & development as
schizophrenia
From neoliberalization to
militarisation in education and
development
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Neoliberalism as policy (1980s onwards)
ƒ Pro-market reforms
ƒ Fiscal austerity
ƒ Narrow view of education
► Late
1990s more wider understanding of
education (democracy, human rights,
citizenship). From HC to Socialisation?
► Linked to shifts in ‘development policy’ –
new wars and 9/11 – security agenda
Post Cold War ‘New Wars’
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Collapse of Soviet Bloc and end of Cold War rivalry
Peace Dividend Quickly faded away
Now these fears have given way to fears of local and regional
wars fought predominantly in poor countries within weak or
failed states and with small arms as the weapon of choice. Most
of the victims in today’s wars are civilians. (UNDP, 2005: 12)
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Post Cold War Shift from Inter-state to intra-state wars
During 1990s increase in civil wars, guerrilla, separatist
struggles, ethnic and religious conflicts
These conflicts have been termed ‘New Wars’ and have
produced an unprecedented scale of ‘humanitarian
interventions’ and ‘social reconstruction programmes’ which, in
turn, have generated new challenges and questioned old
assumptions (Duffield, 2001).
Background to New Wars
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Robert Kaplan (1994) in “The coming anarchy” received a
great deal of attention with his apocalyptic vision of poor
Third World states mired in poverty, racked by civil wars,
devastated by AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and other
diseases, and becoming increasingly remote from the rich
world.
“We are entering a bifurcated world. Part of the globe is
inhabited by Hegel's and Fukuyama's Last Man, healthy,
well fed, and pampered by technology. The other, larger,
part is inhabited by Hobbes's First Man,condemned to a life
that is ‘poor, nasty, brutish, and short’." (p.60).
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Wars
Kaplan (1994) Kaplan, R. “The coming anarchy.” Atlantic Monthly 273 (2), February 1994, 44-76.
War, Poverty and the Global South
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While in 1991 there were 51 conflicts taking place globally, in
2003 there were only 29. However, more people are dying in
these conflicts (Rwandan Genocide left 1 million people dead,
Democratic Republic of Congo lost 7% of the population, in
Sudan 2 million people). UNDP (2005: 153)
Geographical location has also changed with the vast majority
now taking place in low-income countries. Between 1946-89
low-income countries accounted for around one third of all
conflicts; between 1990-2003, this increased to nearly a half.
As the UNDP notes, 40% of the world’s conflicts are in Africa
(UNDP, 2005: 154).
Of the 25 countries ranked lowest in the human development
index in 2004, 23 are in Africa, and 20 are currently or have
recently been in conflict. (UN, 2005: 94). Nine of the 10 lowest
countries on the Human Development Index have experienced
some form of armed conflict since the 1990s, and seven in
recent years while 5 of the 10 countries have the lowest life
expectancy (UN, 2005: 154).
New Wars
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‘new wars’ have noted for targeting civilians and generated
widespread human suffering and human rights violations in
countries where conflict has been present (Kaldor, 1999).
Kaldor (1999) ‘during the 1980s and 1990s, a new type of
organized violence had developed, especially in Africa and
Eastern Europe, which is one aspect of the current globalized
era.
a ‘blurring of the distinctions between war (usually defined as
violence between states or organised political groups for
political motives), organized crime (violence undertaken by
privately organised groups for private purposes, usually
financial gains) and large scale violation of human rights
(violence undertaken by states or politically organized groups
against civilians)’ See Kaldor (1999:1-2)
Exaggerated binary???? North is discriminate in wars, protects
civilians? Southern wars are indiscriminate, attack civilians, use
makeshift weapons???
New Wars, Failed States and
the West after September 11th
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9/11 added impetus to the link between development and
security.
failed states are “more likely to become unstable, to
destabilise their neighbours, to create refugee flows, to
spread disease and to be bases for terrorists”. Conflict in the
post September 11th world has become a problem that can’t
be avoided. (DFID, 2005)
the new post-11 September era ‘is also bipolar, but instead of
being divided between East and West it is divided between
the World of Order and the World of Disorder’ with the
mission of the world of order led by the overwhelming power
of the USA to ‘stabilize and lift up the World of Disorder’.
(Friedman, 2005)
From Development to Containment?
Development, Conflict & the New
Humanitarian Intervention
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Post Cold War environment allowed for more Western/UN
military intervention (peacekeeping, humanitarian)
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With the end of the Cold War, however, the UN was presented with an
opportunity to revive the major peacekeeping and security activities that
many of its early proponents had anticipated. For example, while the UN
dispatched a total of 10 000 peacekeepers to five operations (with an
annual budget of about US$233 million) in 1987, by 1995 the total
number of troops acting as peacekeepers under UN auspices was 72
000. They were operating in 18 different countries and the total cost of
these operations was over $3billion. (Berger, Mark T. and Weber, Heloise(2009)'War, Peace
and Progress: conflict, development, (in)security and violence in the 21st century',Third World Quarterly,30:10
Post Cold War interventionism &
education
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Post Cold War ‘humanitarian intervention’ (Balkans,
Kosovo, Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan)
From non-intervention to human security
Aid and NGOs Working in rather than around conflicts
Aid to conflict & ‘fragile’ states increases sharply – 38.4%
of total ODA to conflict & fragile states
Education part of expansion
ƒ Mission creep
ƒ EFA and conflict
ƒ Debate on how big – but education delivery firmly part of
humanitarian development now.
Enter: Education & Conflict
► Conflict is everywhere? Narrowing the focus to violent
conflict/post conflict
► Emerged as a ‘topic’ within International Education
Research in the late 1990’s
► Post Cold War to New Wars (from inter to intra-state
wars) – where does education fit?
► EFA Goals: DFID(2003) 82% of out of school children
are in conflict/post-conflict states
► Education emerges as both potential cause/solution
► Rising interest in non-market role of Education – again!!!
Education & Conflict: mapping the field
► Impact of war and conflict on education
(examples from Colombia) Link
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Attacks on teachers and students
Installations, funding, insecurity
Access (displacement etc)
Psychologically
► Impact of education on war
& conflict
Conflict→
Peace →
Unstable & unequal
societies
social cohesion &
justice
•Social exlusion/
poverty
•Equal rights &
opportunities
•Indoctrination
•Tolerance
•Violence
•Respect for
diversity
‘TWO FACES OF EDUCATION
Bush & Salterelli (2000)
Impact of education on war & conflict
Davies (2006:1): ‘How war & peace are taught’
Conflict status & Education:
Tawil/Harley (2004)
Seitz 2004: 52
Forms of violence
Education
Seitz 2004: 52
Education
Conflict
= context specific
Seitz 2004: 54
Back to the Future: Education Aid
and the Cold War
► If
education can indeed both contribute and
prevent conflict, how have international donors
engaged with this issue?
► Neoliberalism dominated agendas in the 1990s,
but education/conflict issues began to emerge..
► How was education used during the Cold War?
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Volume
Trajectory
Nature
Education & Conflict: Cold War
lessons
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USAID paid the University of Nebraska U.S.$51 million from 1984
to 1994 to develop and design these textbooks, which were mostly
printed in Pakistan. Over 13 million were distributed at Afghan
refugee camps and Pakistani madrasas. (International Crisis Group
2002: 13).
A maths textbook for 4th grade children raises the following
question (ibid: 92-93):
The speed of a Kalashnikov bullet is 800 meters per second. If a Russian is at
a distance of 3,200 meters from a mujahid, and that mujahid aims at the
Russian’s head, calculate how many seconds it will take for the bullet to strike
the Russian in the forehead.
Are we all soldiers now? Education
as Counterinsurgency
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“As I speak, just as surely as our diplomats and military,
American NGOs are out there serving and sacrificing on the
front lines of freedom . . . . I am serious about making
sure we have the best relationship with the NGOs who are
such a force multiplier for us, such an important part of our
combat team. [We are] all committed to the same, singular
purpose to help every man and woman in the world who is
in need, who is hungry, who is without hope, to help every
one of them fill a belly, get a roof over their heads,
educate their children, have hope.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell, Remarks to the
National Foreign Policy Conference for Leaders of
Nongovernmental Organizations, at
http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2001/5762.htm
Education as Counterinsurgency
► June
2008, USAID 3-D approach, defence ,
diplomacy development
► Increased concern with Madrasa education?
► US gov. Annual ‘Patterns of Global Terrorism has
section on Education
► G. Brown, Sept 2009 in speech on Afghanistan
links education to ‘hearts & minds’ strategy
► Iraq & Afghanistan: Provisional Reconstrcution
Teams (army constructing schools)
► How do aid agencies separate themselves? Or
not?
Possible Implications:
Increased focus on military issues detracts
from educational objectives?
► From sustainable projects to strategic
investment (check funding)
► Reduced Interest in MDG’s?
► Discredit broader humanitarian role of
development aid ?
► Increased danger for humanitarian workers,
including education workers….?
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Attacks on Humanitarian Workers
(1997-2008)
Relative Attacks (1997-2008)
Jackie Kirk (1968-2008)
Between empire & utopia:
development as schizophrenia
Development (and Education therein) has
always been pulled by different objectives:
between idealism & realism
► The pendulum today has swung towards
the politicisation/militarisation of
development and education is becoming
implicated in that…
► Time for education academics &
practitioners to think through this process
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